the rogue and the rose
by kigamin
Summary: Leorio is the first human to become a god, seeking the power to heal his dying best friend. Cheadle is the first goddess to return to the world below, tasked with hunting the human who stole godly power. They meet in a clash of powers, but with the calling of two cores so similar under layers of differences, they find rogue and rose may have more in common. [gift for jyuanka]
1. legends

**A/N: **Hi there! This little Leodle story is a gift for my lovely friend jyuanka, who's so very precious to me and a goddess all by herself.

Love u moos vitch, I hope you had a great time! *hug*

* * *

**1 - legends**

**⋨ just as the legends say ⋩**

Fairies, elves, fae folks, muses.

Winged, horned, all-powerful, all-knowing.

With sunlight in their hair, moonlight in their gazes, elements bending at the will and whims of their fingertips.

Leorio was a child when he first heard of the Garden of Divinities. Deities living in a sky castle with a garden as big as the world, elementals and almighty beings playing with the tide of the sea as he did when he threw pebbles in puddles. The elders in his village told stories about them, those fantastical beings turned into gods, every night. And every night, Leorio would sit next to the others to listen to those godly tales, mesmerized, dreaming of muses and fairies and nymphs spinning wheat and blowing on the land and sewing stars into the sky.

The legend went like this: everyone can become a god. Everyone. Each and every being, even orcs and witches and werewolves and the smallest of children, could pretend to the status of divinity, as long as they had the power to claim it.

There were two ways to do so.

The first — natural, honorable, deserved — was to be worthy.

If one could control the wild tides better than Leol and the whimsical lightning better than Killua and the roaring of nature better than Gon, then one could take their place, would they be bestowed that duty by the god of gods — Netero himself. It was rare, that one would manage that prowess, but the divinities that could rise to the top through the sole will of their powers were to be feared and respected. Destitute gods would serve as their subordinates, forever humbled and quieted by the greater, dignified deity.

The second — brutal, vile, radical — was to kill a god.

Leorio had read about those assassin gods. Silva, god of Chaos, an assassin of night elves turned deity, head of the legendary Zoaldyeck family born from the core of a storm. Hisoka, god of Tricksters, of Liars, of everything rotten in the hearts of palaces and the secrecy of their bedrooms. Chrollo, god of Thieves and Thief of gods, with his crew of orcs and fae folks born from the mud and the ashes. They had all claimed their throne with bloody hands and the bounties of the killed gods, forcing their way into the Garden of Divinities, stealing the deity's power as their own.

He was fifteen years old when he asked the elders if any human had ever become a god. Surely, in the infinity of creatures that roamed on the known world, there had to be a chosen one, a witch powerful enough to will elements better than any god, a wizard creative enough to find new spells to cast, a warrior born on the battleground and brave enough to defy a god.

The elders had laughed at him.

"There are no gods among us! Just flesh and bones that bleed and break at the first fall."

No human had ever been elevated to the status of deity — none, in all history of divinities. Not even the witches in the wilds and the wizards across the isles and the warriors that fought for the king.

When Pietro fell ill, prey to an illness no doctor in the human world could cure, Leorio knew he had to be the first.

* * *

**⋨ just as the legends lie ⋩**

There was no such thing as absolute power. No almighty, no all-knowing, no all-powerful being.

Cheadle would know; she had had her wings clipped and her hands bound and her voice silenced time and time again, one goddess in a sea of gods all striving for the top.

The legends went like this: all gods could exercise their powers on their respective attribution. Malzi ruled over the Darkness, Satotz over Travelers, Menchi over Harvest with the god of Gluttony, Buhara. And Cheadle, goddess of medicine and science, one of the twelve Zodiacs that passed down Netero's will onto the rest of the divinities, over Knowledge.

Every seventh day of the month, the Zodiacs called all the other gods to the Council of Awakened to discuss matters of the below-world — where humans and fantastical beings and supernatural creatures festered. Beside those ordinary meetings that so very often ended with fights — Illumi and Killua didn't get along despite being brothers, Kurapika abhorred Chrollo, and no one liked Hisoka — they rarely met, unless urgent issues brought them together in extraordinary meetings.

During those meetings, each god had the same voice, and each got a vote. That seemed fair, right?

Well, that was just the theory.

In practice, Cheadle ruled over little more than her own mind — and even that, with Pariston's tricks and Netero's cryptic orders and her own anxiety, that wasn't sure. Time and time again she had tried to exercise her godly power and gift the humans with knowledge of immunity treatments and electric fields and planet arrangements, and time and time again she had been stopped by the other gods who feared what humans could do with knowledge.

"Ever since they have taught themselves to weld iron, fae folks and fairies have been captured and sold on slavery trades," Cluck had said. "They do not value other lives. They only have eyes for themselves, and for how they can benefit from others."

"We cannot trust the humans with knowledge," Piyon had added. "They are greedy. Every new invention is turned into a war machine. Look at their advanced torture machinery yet half of their continent still cannot drink without dying of cholera."

"I don't think humans are that terrible, but they are still too selfish," Beyond had diluted. "Their power structure is unbalanced. They think their own folk are lesser than them for having darker skin or accents. They are violent, barbarians."

Cheadle knew all that. She hadn't always been a god, had once been a fairy free to roam as she pleased, had explored the world and seen it as it was. She had seen the witches burnt at the stake and the wizards hunted by their fellow, the wars that had torn entire countries, the preposterous superstitions that willed their sword in the name of deities they didn't believe in and kindled their pyres for beliefs forged in hatred and greed.

Yet she couldn't forget. The old witch who had upturned earth and sky during a storm to concoct an ointment that would heal Cheadle's broken wing. The young woman who had busted her out after she was captured by hunters and had hidden her from them, risking her own life for what was right. The wizard who had cast an illusion over her wings to let her blend in with the humans just so she could watch her favorite play with them. The carnival where everyone dressed as something they weren't and danced from dusk to dawn and shared treats regardless of their origins.

There was no perfect creature. The humans, selfish and greedy as they were, were proof of that. And when Cheadle watched young mothers die as they gave birth and tots as weak as pixies die from the flu, she _burned _to do something.

(Besides, with deities like Hisoka in their supposed perfect garden, Cheadle had stopped believing in the so-called higher status of her own.)

"You say they're not that bad, that they're resourceful, and I want to believe you, Cheadle," Mizai, her one trusted friend, had mused when she had told him her thoughts. "I've seen good humans too. But they are the only species that has never ascended to our garden. Netero says it's because they need to be ruled over; I don't agree, but until a human becomes a god, I will have to be cautious."

And so went all of her conversations, all of her debates. With power shivering in her hands that she couldn't use, and knowledge sizzling in her brain that she couldn't share. Never had she spent a day without envying Ging, that bastard, who had since long relinquished his rule to wander in the world in search of new civilizations to dig up.

"What good is power if I can't do anything with it? Damn their rules and their expectations," was what he had told her, and though she remained loyal to Netero, there were days where she dared to ask herself that same question. "I don't need no throne; as long as I still have that power I was born with, I don't need whatever those asshats pretend to have. Greater power? For what, sitting around that stupid table and conclude that we shouldn't intervene, as usual? My ass."

Ging was no reference. He was selfish, had given up on his own son, didn't know how to be a friend and even less a lover — she would know, for having known the misery and wonder that loving him was. But he was also right.

She had sacrificed so much to get where she was. Had given up on a life of exploration and discoveries and freedom for the opportunity to change the world — something a simple fairy with blessed hands couldn't do on her own, not without the power of Knowledge. And yet every day she had to prove herself time and time again to take up the space she wanted to take. All these dreams of hers — these endless ambitions and aspirations — stifled in a casket and balloted in uncertainty as she wondered if her ideas would ever see the light of day. Because the sharks were watching — and they had infinite patience.

The legends lied.

The gods weren't equal. They weren't almighty. They weren't perfect, and they were even less kind. That status, those privileges, this power — all of it was ornament. Nothing worthwhile happened, not in the garden and certainly not with the council.

"Going into the human world? For what?" Netero asked, looking at her with eyes wide as saucers.

"To make a change," Cheadle answered. "With all due respect, I don't feel useful here. I would be more apt to make something, anything happen, if I were down there with them."

Netero laughed. "Cheadle! Don't be foolish. No god has ever returned to the human world after their ascension. Don't forget that without your House, you are still a fairy. A stake of iron in your heart and you are done for."

"I have spent more time below than I have here; I would be _fine_."

Netero tutted. "Pluck those ridiculous thoughts from your mind, young fairy. The gods can't travel below. Your rule is too important here to be risked for those pesky humans."

After their ascension, the gods were banned from returning down below. No god had ever dared to — not after the rumors of murdered gods and stolen powers from rogue creatures that they whispered among themselves.

When a human being broke into the House of Time, murdering its god and stealing his power, Cheadle knew she had to be the first.

* * *

**A/N:** so! this is going to be a multichapter story, albeit a short one. If you like Leorio with Cheadle or are curious of this gem of a ship, check out jyuanka's stories and tumblr! she's on both ffnet and ao3 and is an amazing, amAZING writer.

Until the next one, bye!


	2. born

**⋨ born in the fracture of two worlds ⋩**

Growing up an orphan taught Leorio three things.

One, there were a lot more orphans than there were children without parents. Most people who called themselves family only did so because of a superficial moral obligation. All those daughters betrothed at their youngest age and forced to be women before their time, those sons sent to the army of the king to die in the infantry and become another name in the ever-growing cemetery, those children forgotten and forsaken that became mouths to feed and pensions to receive for their caretakers. So many of them were more orphaned than he would ever be.

Two, people didn't care. Not really. They pretended to, whenever it was convenient, whenever it was proper and expected, whenever he could be an object of debate or an argument in a political fight or a reason for more funding to the orphanage that he would never see the light of — not through his tattered curtains in his bruised attic. He wasn't relevant enough to worry about, but worrying about orphans was the norm, a morally safe position to adopt, so people pretended. It was all they did anyway.

Three, found family was all that mattered. Family didn't have to be a mother and a father, after all. It didn't even have to be blood bonds either. Pietro — with his missing tooth, his snorting guffaw, his lockpicking skills that would warrant jail if the village chief got word of it but that he only used to slip into the barn to pet the horses — was enough family for Leorio as it was.

It was Pietro who had taught Leorio how to ride a horse and skip stones on the lake and make dyes with the flowers in the meadow for their drawings. It was with Pietro that he had snuck into the school of the nearby city, huddled under windows with a stolen book and a piece of charcoal, ears trained to the sound of the teacher's voice muffled through the walls, to learn how to read together. And it was also Pietro, only Pietro, who knew that Leorio also liked boys.

Pietro was, for Leorio, a reflection of the world.

Leorio was nineteen when that world collapsed, fractured as Pietro fell ill.

The healers were categoric: Pietro's illness was nothing they had ever seen. As if his body was self-destructing, rotten by a curse stronger than any potion could tame. Leorio would watch them march into Pietro's room, a different healer every day summoned by the elders, only to leave without an explanation or a hint as to what could relieve the young man's pains.

And day after day, it got worse.

Just weeks later, Pietro was already the shadow of himself — deathly thin, barely holding together. He couldn't sit, could barely eat. Healers paraded but lost interest in this peculiar new illness. People started suspecting a bad omen — some families demanded Pietro be moved out of the village, his only salvation being the elders' protection. Soon enough, Leorio and Grandma Mona were the only ones to still come see him.

The sight of his best friend and only family bedridden and agonizing and _dying _left Leorio with a gaping hole in his chest. After losing his family once, he was not prepared to lose it again. Pietro couldn't go yet. They hadn't even lived their dream of moving to the city and tasting those treats that came from out of the borders. There were still so many things to do and ambitions to live and stories to share and stars to count. What about their small cottage with the rooftop, the taverns they had to visit, the delights of the theater they had sworn themselves they would see at least once?

He couldn't go yet.

Faced with the utmost disinterest of all the regional healers and the reality of the dangerously elapsing time, Leorio dug up old legends he had promised to rewrite.

Sometimes all you could do in the face of doom was travel in the fracture of two worlds and defy a god.

* * *

**⋨ born on the bridge of two worlds ⋩**

Fairies were always born in their elements.

Fire fairies took their first breath in the core of volcanoes. It was with the fizz and spark of bubbling lava and fire that cracks like a whip that they took their first flight with incandescent wings, often followed by rivulets of magma.

Water fairies — not to be confused with mermaids, those pesky sea divas — were usually found in the bottom of ponds and lakes or the depths of the oceans, only coming back to the surface to catch their breath before diving back to the coral reefs and algae nests where they had first seen the light.

Sun fairies, with their wings of sunlight, their lively energy, their scorching presence, their warming gazes, were also called firebirds for they were often born near bird nests where the sun catches into tree leaves and light is plentiful.

Moon fairies, cousins of night elves but no less different, took their energy from the tide and the silver glow that ghosted over the clouds at night, as discreet as their cradle of pale light in brooks basking under the moon

With her confrontative personality, her corrosive wit, and her rock-solid principles, most beings would expect Cheadle, a fairy through and through, to be born in the heart of a planet or at the bottom of the Stix.

But Cheadle was born into a rose.

She was the first of her kind. While there were as many kinds of fairies as there were fairies, no one had ever seen a rosebud open to the sleeping form of a pixie. It was for some a miracle and for others a terrible omen.

When she was born, people hadn't believed she would survive long. She had been tiny and frail as a pixie before growing into an adult, with wings so weak they could barely support her microscopic weight. But hell would freeze before Cheadle gave up on anything, and so she had taught those paper wings of hers to fly. The fairies of her small meadow had given her a few years to live; decades later, she had grown as tall and healthy as a human being.

She had never been one to give up.

Her powers weren't too apparent at first. Fire fairies could start fires out of nothing. Water fairies could bend water and ice to their will. Sun fairies could shine their light even in utmost darkness. Moon fairies could play with shadows and stifle light with a snap of their fingers.

Rose fairies — the one rose fairy to have ever existed — were quite the mystery.

It never bothered Cheadle much. She had been a curious pixie even as she grew, but not a reckless one, so most of her young years had been spent observing other fantastical beings and picking up their cues. She had learned from the witches what plants to use when ill or wounded, had listened to the moon's calls with night elves during their dusk rituals, had put together weapons and potions with the orcs that most were afraid to befriend but who had accepted her as their own. With all this knowledge and all these allies, powers weren't so necessary.

Until the day she met Ging.

⁛

She found him wounded, bleeding into a clearing, with half a dozen arrows planted into his back, his blood seeping through his clothes and dripping on the grass. Highwaymen, she had thought, until she saw his skin decay under the glinting iron of the arrows and knew what he was. His assailants, too, had to know.

"You ever intend to help or are you just going to stand there forever?" the man grunted, gasping as he caught himself on the trunk of a tree.

Cheadle stared at him curiously, unbothered by the blood oozing unceasingly by his feet. Her hands burned, urged to reach for the man's wounds and dip her hands in the blood. The thought was as obsessing as it was disturbing.

"You're making me consider the latter," she said, taking cautious steps toward him. She had been trapped by fairy hunters once — people who made themselves look weak and in need of help, only to strike the fairies with nets of iron. Yet the blackening skin under the iron arrow was no artifice; that man had the same blood as hers in his veins.

"Really, now? Is it really the moment to joke?" the man deadpanned, sitting on a stump. He twisted himself to grab an arrow planted in his shoulder and shouted as he yanked it away.

"I have all the time in the world," she replied, now only a few steps from his back. "Do you?"

He yanked another arrow, grunting, the fleshly sound echoing through shudders up her spine.

"Blasted hunters," he mumbled under his breath. "I didn't know they controlled this area too."

Her eyes were riveted on the red mess on his back. "They spread every day."

"You know any safe path to the Black Forest?"

The wound, pulsing, called to her. "You need to go by air; there are inns with dragons for rent managed by an orc just a few miles from here. Humans can't follow."

"Right. But that's if I reach the inn before bleeding out," he mumbled, yanking another arrow, bucking as he inhaled and gritted his teeth.

Her gaze followed the sinuous rivulets of blood on his back. Before she could know better, her fingertips were tracking them, tracing the bloody tear of flesh, wild energy pulsing along her arm. As a flame without fire, welding the flesh and nerves together, the wound closed, a mere scar remaining in its place, and the iron rot dissolved.

She barely heard her own gasp. Stared down at what she had done — the wound she had healed so perfectly — with a mixture of horror and pride and curiosity and _euphoria_. With her heart wild in her chest, confusion doubled as the man reached for the scar with a dumbfounded expression.

"How did you do that?" he breathed, turning suspicious eyes toward her.

She shook her head, stared at the red stains on her fingers.

"I don't know."

That day, the god of gods himself descended from his perch in the sky to applaud Cheadle's godly power.

When Netero extended his hand toward her, a lost fairy until then unaware of her own blessing, Cheadle didn't know she would sign for a deal that would cost her everything she had ever longed for — freedom, curiosity, ambitions. Independence.

And so, in her ascension to the garden of divinities, she rode on the bridge of two worlds.


End file.
